Large new mineral projects often influence international mineral marke
ts. The Carajas iron ore project in Brazil is a recent example. This p
aper concludes that production from Carajas depressed the reference pr
ice level for iron ore in the late 1980s and thus brought about both p
ermanent changes to that commodity market structure and revenue losses
to other iron ore producers. For this reason, the international effec
ts of large projects should be taken into account by project planners
during project appraisal.